Latest Protocol Releases

Greetings, MultiversX Builders!

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The Vega Release (rc/v1.7.10) is officially live, marking another important milestone in our roadmap. This release brings into production one of the most awaited and discussed upgrades, Phase 4 of the Staking module. Along this, other 2 features are being added, and 29 fixes and optimizations.

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Key Highlights:

• Staking phase 4 [#4934]- this feature proposes important changes with the core goals of increasing the total EGLD staked and contributing further to the network decentralization. The most important one is the removal of the existing 3,200 nodes cap and the queue system, which at the moment allows new validators to join only when others leave, with an auction-based free-market mechanism. 
• Chain Simulator [#5558]- This simulator is designed to replicate the behavior of a local testnet. Unlike a traditional testnet, this simulator operates without a consensus group, allowing for isolated testing and development and should require less resources compared with a local testnet.
• Enable epochs handler [#5419] - This feature refactors the enable epochs component to become more extensible and avoid the unnecessary changes in the satellite repos for the mx-chain-go repo.

We’ve covered these updates in our recent validators sessions on Discord. To ensure a seamless transition, we encourage all developers to review the changes outlined in this release and prepare accordingly before May 21st, the day when the activation will take place. For support, queries, or further clarifications, please reach out to us on Telegram, Discord, or your preferred communication channel.

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Calling all validators!

We're rolling out a new upgrade for the validator nodes. We introduce a patch that brings some minor fixes but also adds the possibility to execute historical vm-queries operations.

Thank you for your continued support and cooperation. For support, queries, or further clarifications, reach out to us on Telegram, Discord, or your preferred communication channel.

Calling all validators!

We're rolling out a new upgrade for the validator nodes. You might recall the last update's short notice, where we had to delay activating the```MigrateDataTries```feature. Thankfully, the issue was confined to devnet only, leading to the hard fork on January 18. Since then, the team has focused on resolving this, with long-hours of debugging and testing. Now, we want to introduce a patch that fixes the issue and also performs the trie balancing. This ensures that gas costs align with the previously announced Phase 2 details, which you can review here: https://dynamic-gas.multiversx.com .

Thank you for your continued support and cooperation. For support, queries, or further clarifications, reach out to us on Telegram, Discord, or your preferred communication channel.

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Calling all validators!

We're rolling out a new upgrade for your nodes! This release introduces one important fix:

• VM 1.5 fix;

For support, queries, or further clarifications, reach out to us on Telegram, Discord, or your preferred communication channel.

Calling All Validators!

We're rolling out a new upgrade for your nodes! This release maintains full backward compatibility with version 1.6.7.0 previously announced and introduces two key fixes:

• Performance Enhancement: We've addressed a potential performance degradation issue that could occur during the transition epoch when upgrading nodes from version 1.5.x to 1.6.x.
• Node Stability Improvement: A fix has been implemented for a previously identified malfunction in the single-key redundancy node, a critical update to reduce the likelihood of increased Validator/Leader Failures.

For support, queries, or further clarifications, reach out to us on Telegram, Discord, or your preferred communication channel.

Greetings, MultiversX Builders! The Sirius Release (rc/v1.6.7) is officially live, marking a significant milestone in our roadmap. This release introduces over 18 new features, several critical breaking changes, and numerous fixes and improvements. It sets the stage for the upcoming Vega Release and paves the way for our goal of reducing finality time to 3 seconds.

🔧 Key Highlights:

• Multikey Support (#4741): Enhances node functionality by allowing them to sign with multiple keys, boosting security and flexibility in operations.
• Consensus Signature Check Optimization (#4467): Major CPU efficiency improvements in block signature verification during consensus, reducing processing time significantly.
• Governance v3 Contract (#4879): Introduction of a new governance contract in Go, running alongside existing system SCs, offering refined proposal and voting mechanisms.
• DNS v2 (#5045): An update to the DNS functionality, allowing multiple and deletable user names, managed through specialized smart contracts.
• Balance Data Tries (#4636): In the data trie, values are now saved at the hash of the key instead of the original key, ensuring a balanced structure by randomizing the keys. A 'Version' field is added for backward compatibility, and a new API endpoint confirms if an account's data trie is fully migrated.
• VM1.5 (#4789): Integration of the new smart contract processor with features like Multi-async, ManagedBigFloats, ManagedMap, BackTransfers, and updated to Wasmer 2.2.
• Transaction Execution Ordering Refactor (#4918): Redesigns the grouping and execution order of transactions for improved efficiency and reliability in cross-shard interactions.
• Dynamic Gas Cost Introduction(#749): This change addresses a previously unnoticed imbalance—the time consumed for accessing the trie wasn't reflected in transaction consumed gas.

We've covered these updates in our recent developer sessions on Discord. To ensure a seamless transition, we encourage all developers to review the changes outlined below and prepare accordingly before January 16th. For support, queries, or further clarifications, reach out to us on Telegram, Discord, or your preferred communication channel.